The Distance
by CarlitosCandy
Summary: Jeff Hardy / Kelly Kelly. Kelly struggles with a harsh and unknown truth while laying in the aftermath of the one night stand she'd always wanted. Ah, better than it sounds. Romance/confliction, R/R
1. Chapter 1

_faithful readers (hopefully you're still out there!), this is one of my latest pieces; a 2-part romance/lust fic titled "The Distance". It's been so long since I wrote one of these introductions I really have no idea what to say. Aside from I'm sorry about all off the typos in advance, and forgive me for my horrific author's rot. Tthis is the first work I've written in a very LONG time._

_Read and review! The second part will be up sooner than you think._

_Love, Candy_

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_**The Distance**_

_the sky glows... I can see it shining when my eyes close._

I can honestly say I don't know what I'd been thinking...if the sparse scramble of motion in my mind at the time could even be considered a thought. I'd heard it all the time, from random lose girls that'd find their way into the doors of the WWE and onto the beds of its' finest stars. "I don't know how it happened," they'd say. And from the others; "It is what it is." I, being a level-headed woman of self respect, would scoff and roll my eyes. Sex doesn't just _happen_.. it has a motive, a life, an execution. Its an ever-existant flame fueled by lust, low self-esteem, false promises. And no matter what the shallow blondes, still sticky with aftermath, would say with swollen eyes in the locker room..it is still a big deal. Sex, in its entirety, can never be considered 'nothing'.

Now I, the blond woman who kept her legs closed, found herself suddenly thrown into the shallow wake of drunken, careless sex..and could think of no greater excuse than what the faceless girls threw around like their disgarded tops. It was nothing...it was nothing.

My legs still trembled as I drove down the empty streets of our town, the low streetlights yet harsh against my eyes, long attached to the darkness of the bedroom. My body was drained, both tired and tense from the sudden climax of the night. My subconscious mind spun rapidly, turning and tossing against the numbness like an ocean restless before a storm. Time, as it's always done, pushed me forward relentlessly.

I didn't want to think about what just happened...there was no way to make sense of it. There was an odd tug at my heart I tried my best to ignore, and a distant sense of innocence lost within my chest. I sighed as I came upon a red light, and took the moment to rest my head against the steering wheel. Hypocricy had sharp claws, karma's appendage digging into the marked skin of my neck. Who did I think I was for all these years.. sitting in the locker room on my high horse, beliving I was above casual sex and its tide of desperation?

Now, as I remained bound and broken on the ocean floor, I realized that not only was I never above any other woman, chaste or not, but I was also more human than what my superhero persona sometimes lets me believe. Was I a different woman than who I always thought I'd been because of this? Does my perhaps non-existant regret of this night change everything?

It took a few moments for my mind to register that the light had turned green again, any thoughts blocked from both a large amount of alcohol and an aftermath of haze. I drove onto the empty road at a sharp speed, wanting to avoid the vulnerability of the lonely streets. He had left the apartment just the same..in his girlfriend's car, speeding off into the darkness, the scent of every piece of me lingering on his lips. What would he be thinking, crawling into the bed he shared with her tonight? Would she know..?

I thought back to the day I first saw her, and the small seed of guilt that has since been thriving in my core... Carlito and I had been driving around before a show when he decided he needed to pay a visit to the neighboring hotel where Jeff and Matt were both staying. "I just need to drop off something.. it'll only take a minute." I remember his words clearly as he knocked on the door, Matt's dark hair and chest, covered in beads of sweat, greeting us only moments later. We walked in, I with upmost hesitation.. Jeff didn't like me, or anyone else for that matter, around the places he stayed.. I turned the corner, and found the reason.

She was laying on her side upon an unmade bed, flipping through the channels on the tv while the contents of Jeff's suitcase lay strewn out across the room.

"How you doin'?" Carlito asked cooly, his hands on his hips as he stopped infront of their bed. I half hid myself behind his large form.

"Tired," Her words came out in a high-pitched sigh, her hand moving to rest on the large, exposed swell of her stomach. Three tattooed stars stretched over the growing skin, another large generic tattoo rested on her shoulder. She was polite, yet seemed uncomfortable.. the room was hot, my eyes unable to leave what he had created inside of her.

"This is Amy, by the way," Carlito turned to me, finally motioning towards the redheaded, pregnant woman upon the bed. "Amy, this is Kelly,"

We both said our girly "hi's" before Carlito's attention was turned towards Matt, who remained within the other room. I followed him with haste, hoping not to seem rude... yet no longer possessing the heart to look at Jeff's unborn child and the woman he put up with any longer.

Ever since that day, she had found her place within my core of guilt.. and I could think of nothing else now than the pain she never knew she was enduring. This isn't the first time Jeff has done something like this.. hell, he was barley home before 3 on most nights. Was there a way she could know?

I remember so clearly something he'd said to me, on a summer night after a show in Wisconsin.. we sat on the balcony of Carlito's hotel room with our cigarettes and ice packs, speaking of his twisted past.. and perhaps distant future. "They know," He began.. leaving me no hint to who 'they' might've been.. "I can't promise I'll be around."

I felt a burning in the backs of my eyes as I pulled up my driveway, trying my best to avoid the gentle sleep of my roommate. She would scold and punish me to her lesiure had she heard me sneak in at 4 in the morning, the scent of alcohol and sex still lingering in my hair.. on my skin, swimming within my veins. How did I let this happen..?

I hadn't expected sex tonight... in fact, I was looking for some time to cool down, have a few drinks, talk on the porch with Carlito.. a friend I hadn't seen, somehow, in weeks. But when I opened the door to a place that seemed almost my own, the only form that remained locked in my line of vision was Jeff, mixing margaritas while his brother lay limp on the living room couch, playing video games. Carlito, alseep after a night of alcohol, remained passed out completely in the next room..lacking the coherent ability to remember that he'd called me just ten minutes earlier.

I remember looking at Jeff, my heartbeat quickening, his cool words flowing against my face with the strong scent of beer. I'd been clear they'd been drinking all night... the party had all but left when I arrived. But his tolorance was more than impressive, and my eyes fluttered bashfully as he slipped a cold beer within my jello-like palm..his face ever so close to my own.

I loved his eyes, such a bright and glorious green that pierced a soft, romantic innocence within me whenever I dared to take a second look. At times I couldn't help it.. it was like a window inside of him he was too naive to know existed, nor that a fragile woman stood before him.. wanting nothing more than to tear the heartstrings out of his visable, broken chest.

And thats how it all began. One beer sweating within my palm. Ultimately multiplying into six, most of them poured into red plastic cups placed in a haphazard triagle upon a thin green table. I won the first two games, and to this day I remain unconvinced he didn't let me win..just a little bit. He controlled the rest of the games, for both my heart and vision began to blur around the outskirts. A deep and nervous pain began to form at the base of my abdomen.

What happened next followed a night from less than two weeks earlier, when once again I'd stopped by their hotel room in the midst of pain and boredom. Carlito was drunk and suddenly angry, stomping around the hotel room like a deamon without a purpose. One couple left, and the other went to take a walk around the city.. which left Jeff, slightly drunk, and I to pick up the pieces of the night. We ended up doing nothing more than sitting on the crooked, broken chairs of the patio talking for hours.

Carlito wandered in and out from time to time in nothing but his boxers, patting his fuzzy head of hair as if confused. We'd pause mid-sentence and just watch him as he wandered aimlessly, eyeing us both suspiciously before stumbling back inside. The major portion of our conversation existed of mostly his childhood.. his torn and unfortunate youth that somehow brought him here, to the WWE, where wealth and fortune managed to find him, perhaps undeservingly. My voice was hoarse and uncomfortable, so I let him do most of the talking..loving how easliy he let me slip into his world, no matter how shallow, how foggy.

We talked about our families, our siblings..those we traveled with. He leaned in real close when I spoke, and I remained unsure if he was examining my makeup-less face within the moon light or just figuring out if he wanted to try finding that counterpiece somewhere inside me.. the same as I did to him when I believed he wasn't paying attention. It was then, with this new found comfort and broken boundaries, did the conversation flip to its dark underside.

Without even the word 'sex' or 'hook up' mentioned, we managed to make an invisible, unspoken pact that night.. a pact that spoke different volumes of secrecy and lust. It all made sense now, the way he looked at me all along.. the easy entrance into his heart. Pieces of his mastery formed together to strengthen a non-existant bond between us, for he knew as well as I did that if I'd really, truly wanted..I could absolutely ruin him. His career, his relationships, his forming family. But it was this risk that he was willing to take for me that turned me on to him.. I wanted to kiss him then, ever so badly, desperate for any form of true innocence before we dove into a dark depth of water we could never reverse.

Even now as I reflect upon that night, it tugs mercilessly at my heart.. faulters the beating and sends my veins trembling. Like a breath caught within my chest. We both wandered back to our own hotel rooms that night, after the three hours spent innocently yet irreversibly together. Any thought of him after that was no longer the same.. never again was he just Jeff Hardy.. he was a distant and encasing stranger carrying such a big portion of my heart.

I slipped into my bed, loving the comforting and familiar feeling of cold sheets against my tainted skin, the cool breeze through my window rushing over my back like a gentle massage. My mind began to throb, the alcohol starting to pain me more now that time had sunk in. I reached for an old water bottle to my side, yet let my hand fall before it could be reached, too tired and weak to care any longer. I let my eyes flutter shut, my head buried into the soft surface of my pillow, and my mind sunk back into the hazy night only hours ago.

The feeling that had sprung alive inside me at the first sight of him only grew, even with the alcohol drowning in my system, failing to numb me from the outside in as I hoped it would. My entire body trembled with a nervous storm, my stomach turning inside me, my heart beating harshly against my chest. And yet, I stumbled around, knowing the opprotunity we'd both been looking for had finally fell around us.. I wasn't so sure if I'd wanted this anymore, while an entire other being thriving in a distant part of me knew this was something I never knew I needed.

After the beers were gone, the plastic cups emptied, we took our cigarettes and managed to find our way upon the porch. And no matter the distance, the weather, the scenery..most of these hotel patios were one in the same. A suspended slab of concrete with two chairs and perhaps a table. On this certain night I sat with my back against the stone wall, Jeff adjacent to me in a dark wooden chair of his own. The night was warm, but I clung to my sweater mercilessly, watching the ripples dance on the man-made pond before us.

I could barley talk.. my throat and system already dried and irritated. And so he went on about his brother and his career choice, his voice filling both the quickly vanishing space between us and taking up time. I forced my mind to succumb into lost intentions, alcohol, and darkness until only my body thrived. My body, willing and afraid, continued to tremble... from anticipation, the unknown.

Just when my mind managed to drift off completely in a current of beer, Jeff's demeanor changed. I glanced at the screen on my phone hesitantly; we were running out of time. He leaned forward in his chair, and the warmth of his fingertips gliding innocently down the skin of my calve alarmed me. At first, I pretended not to notice.. but that too failed me. I shifted into his quickly rising touch, loving the speck of admiration in his eyes as he discovered the smoothness of my leg.

I do not remember much of what was said after that, nor how I ended up leaning against the balcony with his body pressed flush against mine. I ignored his tainted breath as it flowed across my neck, avoided his drunken kiss. Then, finally taking that final step to the edge of the broken cliff, I silently walked inside, knowing he'd follow.

There were two seperate bedrooms in the hotel room; Carlito remained passed out on the couch while Matt had drifted off to another room in the midst of boredom. We paused there for a moment, in the middle of the living area, my hand finding the zipper of my sweatshirt before allowing it to fall from my shoulders. He glanced around impaitently as I silently waited for him to say something, anything.

He spoke then, in a slight whisper, and I remained too distant to catch what he'd said to me. But I nodded anyway, taking one last peek over that edge..and jumped.

"Then you lead the way," I'd said. He slipped a hand behind him, somehow finding the perfect surface of my open palm and guiding me slowly into the darkness of the hallway.


	2. Chapter 2

_Soooooo this took me a little longer to update than I'd originally planned. Go figure. My apologies!! I just wanted it to be as perfect as possible. This the second and last of the two parts. HUGE thanks to all those who reviewed! Lots of love._

_More stories to come. Keep in touch. Read and review. And enjoy :)  
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"Then you lead the way," I'd said. He slipped a hand behind him, somehow finding the perfect surface of my open palm and guiding me slowly into the darkness of the hallway.

I shut the door behind me slowly, a single window swollen with moonlight the only means of lighting up our existance in that unfamiliar room. I slipped off my shirt as I watched him stumble towards the window, pulling back the sheer curtain as more darkness flooded into the room. Perhaps we were on the same page then... guilt no longer had a face, distinct features of who we were remained hidden in the dark.

I felt uneasy at first, the predetermination of this sex throwing me off guard completely. The alcohol sent a harsh blow to my system, and I finally realized that perhaps my desperate nerves caused me to drink far too much. I crawled upon the bed, kicked back a blanket, and waited for him nervously to join me. My eyes fluttered to a close as I took a slight second to take in the moment that crashed into me like an angry tide. It was then I felt a hand brush through my hair, lingering at my temple. My eyes barley opened as I lifted my head slightly, finally feeling the soft press of his lips against my own.

Oh how long I had waited for a moment I couldn't seem to capture. He pulled back only slightly, and I remember so distinctly now the shape of his head, the strong line of his jaw, outlined in the darkness. The features of his face remained lost. I pulled him back to me, wanting now only to feel for and find the person he was with my body alone. I forced my mind to go elsewhere.

His strong hand moved to the white shorts I had been wearing, tugging at the fabric that remained only a barrier between us. I pulled him tightly against me, my body fitting so perfectly against his much larger, matured form. My manicured nails dug softly into the skin of his neck as my mind lost itself, dispersing into the lust captured within the room. At first, all I could taste was beer. The very substance that filled us with this excuse, this means of abandonment, was what filled my senses now. After this passed, his tongue pressing against mine in a desperate tangle, I could felt the actual dull, gamey taste of a boy.

I could feel my heart as it pounded against my chest, and hear it in my own ears. I wondered for a moment if he could tell I was nervous, or if anything trembling within me was as apparent on the outside as it was in. His chest began to heave against mine as our air supply dwindled, the kisses intensified. The heat of this moment began to gather.

I bent before him to take off my bra and shorts, tossing them carelessly to the side. Taking my time crawling back to his lips, I looked into his peaceful face.. the mischievous grin, the half-lidded eyes, the haphazard scruff... unable to believe this encasing stranger would soon be such a part of me. I met his lips with mine again.

It was at that moment I began to regret the amount of alcohol my nerves made me consume. Each time I tried to wrap myself around his kiss, a wave of this drug would wash it from my mind. But I remember it being beautiful, rare, and everything I had wanted.

Only moments later did I raise once again to remove his baggy red shirt, but I felt his body rise up to me when I reached for the waistband of his shorts. His free arm moved up to my shoulders, his fingers slowly floating over my skin and leaving goosebumps in their shallow wake. He pulled me in for a slow, encasing kiss.

I felt the bubble of passion begin to gather in my abdomen, my body finally reaching through the alcohol to take in this heated moment. I loved feeling of his skin against mine, so simple yet so intensely intimate, and the soft fuzz of his chest brushing against my collarbone. He rolled me over to his side, my back against the cold, scratchy paint on the wall. His hand slipped into the crook of my leg, hooking it around his slim waist, before traveling down to my panties; one of the few barriers that remained between us.

I loved his hands, loved the way they felt pressed into me and upon the soft layers of my skin. They were large and strong, with course palms that traveled all around me. I felt so tiny in his embrace, so vulnerable, and pulled him closer at the nape of his neck..needing him to reassure what my mind was telling me wasn't real.

My mind began to drift, so tired and drained from this evening. It was then I felt him tug at the hem of the cloth, and I half-assisted him in their removal. I shifted lazily into him as he pulled away, his strong hand balancing me at my waist as his eyes sunk into me, on each and every inch of me.

Quickly removing his shorts, he kicked them off of the side of the bed and crawled back to me.. waiting so simply to be within me now. As our lips met again, I felt his weight settle down on top of me, crushing the breath from my chest. My hands found their place on his shoulders as he settled between my legs.

My mind spun rampant, my nerves rolling along the static moving within my skin. I felt him then, the full and fleshy expanse of him, touching timidly around my thigh. My body shook unto my fingertips as I reached down to help him find me. There was always something about this part that held me, a moment so full of promise, encased by pressure, and in some cases, like this, discovery. I gasped, my hand quickly finding its way to his defined bicep for support.

He was gentle, yet urgent.. the sweat already beginning to gather along his neck and chest. He lowered himself down to me, hovering above my form, as our lips met again. He moved slowly, allowing the gentle waves in my mind to roll around the sensations now within me. In a moment, he glided off to the end of the mattress, hooking his hands beneath my legs and dragging me back to him. I felt light, like a newly formed mold, willing and defenseless towards anything he cared to do to me.

My eyes slid to his, unable to connect fully as they blurred and disappeared into the darkness, but my heart fluttered relentless. I reached up to him, towards the sheen that began to gather at his collarbone, and tangled my fingers within the golden chain around his neck. It was one of the few things aside from his ink that never left him, and I felt that much closer to his heart.

I could sense him becoming lost within the pleasure; less attentive towards me now that instinct and alcohol were raging within him. My fingers released his chain, traveling down his arm to his palm, pressed hard against the bed for support. I curled my fingers within his, and, after a short moment, he curled his instinctively back.

He repositioned me slightly soon after, and whimpers and gasps soon began to roll off my lips. My mind spun, lost within his passion, his heart. I opened my eyes once more to him, although they felt heavy, and I, weak. He was concentrating elsewhere, his hand roaming along my skin. I realized, then, how much I admired him so. His humility, his ever-romantic demeanor, his flawless form.

But it saddened me, too, as I searched for any subtle hint of light in his eyes, to know of the desperate battle inside of him. The usually masked pain that slid out from time to time in his words, his glances. The quiet and charming man hidden within an obnoxious, fearless decoy that threw off all who dared to take a second look. I wanted to believe, for my own burning passion, that he was more wounded and in need of nurturing than what appeared. That maybe I would be the one allowed to slide within his arms and into the spaces of his shattered heart. Its a hard pill to swallow knowing that all signs pointed elsewhere.

My eyes remained locked on the ceiling, my senses tearing away as I felt him inside me completely. I was in pain. I tried my best to ignore my emotions. If I thought to hard about anything within the suddenly tangled strands of whatever type of relationship we had, I knew I would lose this moment. And as his hands moved to my chest, strands of his hair clinging to his bulging neck, I knew I wanted him to love me. But I did not know if any sort of prayer or circumstance would allow us to be together, nor if he would ever let me truly love him as well as I knew I could.

This was the closest possible way.

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We stood upon the grassy land of the apartments' backyard...our cars parked only a few spots away in the lot. I stood almost completely still, playing nervously with my keys, not wanting to leave..not knowing how. He stood before me, his height more apparent now that we weren't laying down, and took my face in his hands. Was there anything that could be said?

He mumbled something about a 'next time' in between the kisses, I smiled back upon his lips. We shared a small laugh, and I noticed he had brushed his teeth sometime after everything had ended. I pulled back slightly, trying my hardest to capture his arms lingering around me, before barley speaking a quiet goodnight.

And so, flip flops in hand, the dew already sticking to my feet, I crawled into my truck and watched in my rear view mirror as he drove away. That was the last of him I saw or heard of until the next show taping.

And as I laid in bed that night, my mind was still unable to wrap itself around the silently disintegrating moment, already having forgotten many details of the night I'd want nothing more than to remember. But life, as it always does, went on as it should. The lamp cast the same old shadows on the walls of my bedroom, and the late night breeze swept across my marked and naked back as I fell asleep.

But as my eyes fluttered shut on that summer night, I knew nothing of the passion that would continue to linger in Jeff's broken chest. I did not sense his passion, masked by the calm text messages he would send to me late into nights on the road. We would meet secretly, quickly, blindly. I did not know of the sharp jealously he would carry when he found out my relationship with Carlito grew into something more.

I did not know of the pain I would feel that day at a Houston stadium, the night his first child was born. A beautiful baby girl who would one day grow up to be a woman, a woman who loved him more than I ever could.

But as each of us crawled into bed that night, our mouths and skin tainted with the marks of the other, there remained no space for the collision of regret. We both remained silent, and in the foggy haze of the next morning, I felt somehow branded anew. It took months for anyone within our close circle of friends to find out about our affair. To most, it went by unnoticed. But to Carlito, sitting across from me with anger clenched within his fists and a harsh pain in his heart, there wasn't enough I could say to save us.

I am sorry, I am sorry... it was nothing.

...

_And if all your love was wasted.._

_then who the hell was I?_


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